Page 2

Rosabelle

Chapter 2

I sidestep Lieutenant Soledad, absently running my hand along the cold weapon slung across my chest. Soledad is no longer a lieutenant the way he once was; the title is a relic of another time. In this newly imagined world he’s the head of our island’s security, which makes him nothing more than a glorified busybody. And a tyrant.

I nod at familiar faces as they pass, their eyes anxiously tracking between myself and Soledad, who’s fallen into step beside me. Snow is beginning to stick to the ground; spirals of smoke curl away from stacked chimneys, smudging the skies like errant brushstrokes. I adjust the balaclava on my face; the wool is old and itchy. I am impatient.

“I thought our appointment was for tomorrow,” I say flatly.

“I thought I’d surprise you,” he says. “Impromptu interrogations often yield interesting results.”

I come to a halt, turning to face him.

I remember when Soledad was young and fit and full of bravado—when he served under my father, the chief commander and regent of Sector 52. Now he’s somehow barrel-chested but soft; stooped. His skin is waxy, his hair thinning. He wears the stale air of another time, the only lingering evidence of that epoch imprinted on his face. A soft blue glow pulses at his temples, his dark eyes occasionally brightening, then dimming.

Unbidden, my right arm trembles.

Quietly I change course for the day, feeling the pressure of a single, physical key tucked inside in the false pocket sewn into Papa’s old coat. The only lock I own is bolted to the shed camouflaged in the wilds beyond the cottage—which I meant to visit first, and which I’ll now have to avoid. No one in the pit knows about the lock because the lock is illegal; the homes in the pit are meant to be borderless. Our minds, too, are meant to be open at all times for inspection. It was the way of our parents, the way of The Reestablishment.

Surveillance is security , Papa used to say. Only criminals need privacy.

I glance at Soledad, who still wears his old military fatigues, the front pocket adorned with the tricolored emblem of a buried era. He lost an arm during the post-revolution skirmishes and wears his prosthetic proudly, one sleeve rolled up to reveal the silver gleam of muscular machinery.

“So,” he says. “We can set up here, or we can head back to central. Your choice.”

I cast a furtive glance around the pit, which comprises a cluster of cottages, square windows aglow in the gray morning light. People scurry along, heads down, avoiding eye contact with Soledad, who’s never paid the pit a visit without doing some damage. Those who live here have been sanctioned—cut off from the community for any number of infractions—but no one has lived here longer than Clara and me, who’ve never known another home on the island. In the chaotic weeks after our supreme commanders were slaughtered, Papa sent us here with Mama, promising to follow as soon as he could. It turned out Papa had stayed behind on purpose, voluntarily surrendering to the rebels. As a reward, we were sanctioned upon arrival.

“Do we have to do this now?” I ask, thinking of Clara, shivering and starved. “I’d rather keep our appointment for tomorrow.”

“Why, you have plans this morning?” He says this like it’s a joke. “You’re not allowed a shift at the mill today.”

A sharp pang of hunger cuts through me then, nearly taking my breath away. “Just some things to do.”

Soledad grabs my chin and I suppress a flinch, steadying myself as he forces me to look at him. He stares into my eyes for a long beat before letting go, and I kill the flare of revulsion in my chest, compelling my racing heart to slow.

I remind myself that I am dead inside.

“So strange not to know what you’re thinking,” he says, a notch forming between his brows. “All these years and I still haven’t gotten used to it. Makes it hard to believe you’re always telling the truth.”

Another slight tremor moves through my right hand. I’m the only person here unconnected to the Nexus. Even Clara was brought online before Papa was arrested. Just before the end, all civilians under the directive of The Reestablishment had been connected to the neural network, a program quickly dismantled by the new regime. Soledad and the others like to remind us that the reason we lost the war was because the rebels hadn’t been chipped.

I have no acceptable excuse.

“Pity we can’t seem to get you online again,” Soledad says finally. “Things might’ve been easier for you.”

Memories flare to life: cold metal; muted screams; drug-induced nightmares. With Mama dead, there was no one to beg them to stop. No one who cared whether their experiments would eventually kill me.

“I couldn’t agree more,” I lie.

Soledad shifts his weight. Blue veins of light pulse through his metal arm, silver fingers flashing as they flex and curl. “So,” he says. “Why’d you miss the meeting last week?”

Just like that, an unofficial interrogation has begun. Here, in the freezing cold. While my neighbors watch.

Clara, I realize, can probably see us from the window.

There’s a sudden chorus of shouts and my heart stutters, steadying only when I spot Zadie’s twin boys, Jonah and Micah, tackling each other in the snow. One of them punches the other in the gut, this accomplishment punctuated by peals of laughter. I catch the drifting scent of breakfast meat from a nearby cottage and my knees nearly give out.

I return my eyes to Soledad. “Clara was sick.”

“Coma?”

“No.” I look away. “She spent most of the night throwing up.”

“Food?”

“Blood,” I clarify.

“Right.” Soledad laughs. He sizes me up through Papa’s overlarge coat. “That makes more sense, considering the fact that you’re both starving.”

“We’re not starving.” Another lie.

A fresh circus of sound short-circuits my nervous system. A murder of crows lands heavily on a nearby roof, eerie calls clamoring, wings flapping. I’m watching them, fascinated a moment by an iridescent sheen of black feathers when two earsplitting shots ring out.

I stiffen on impulse—then force myself to thaw, my fingers to unclench, my pulse to slow.

“Fucking birds,” Soledad mutters.

He walks over to the duo of fallen bodies, then stomps on their small, hollow bones, smearing blood and feathers into the snow. I blink, exhaling softly into the cold. I’ve been dead inside for years, I remind myself.

Most people here hate the birds for what they represent. The birds mean that The Reestablishment has been dethroned, that the project has all but failed. The New Republic and its traitorous leaders—the children of our fallen supreme commanders—have been a ripe source of hatred for as long as I can remember.

Clara, I realize, will have questions about the gunshots.

“I’ve got real work for you, if you’re interested,” says Soledad, now wiping his boots on a clean patch of ground.

I look up. Realization is swift. “You didn’t come here for an interrogation.”

Soledad smiles at me, but his eyes are unreadable. “Never misses a thing, this one. I’ve always hated that about you.”

“How many this time?” I ask, my heart beginning a traitorous rhythm.

“We’ve got four altogether. Three have been processed already. New one came through last night and he’s definitely—” Soledad’s eyes brighten, glazing over in an inhuman shade of blue. Suddenly he whips around, marches over to the twins still grappling in snow, grabs one of them— Micah—by the scruff of his neck, and shoves him, angrily, to the ground. “You’ve just lost your rations for the week.”

Jonah darts forward. “But— We were only playing around—”

“He was going to take your eye out,” Soledad barks, then jerks his head in a familiar motion.

Micah screams.

Jonah stills, but his eyes are fixed on his brother, who’s lying on the ground, now silent and twitching violently. There’s the slam of a door, a sudden cry, and his mother, Zadie, comes running. Soledad shakes his head in disgust, and Micah is released from his paralysis. With some effort, the boy revives in his mother’s arms.

“Sorry, sir,” says Micah, his chest heaving. “I didn’t mean—”

Soledad directs his next words to Zadie. “If you can’t get these two idiots to stop acting like animals, you’ll spend another year in the pit. Is that clear?”

Heads appear, then disappear, in neighboring windows.

Zadie nods, mumbling something inarticulate, then grabs her boys and bolts.

In the quiet aftermath Soledad returns to my side, scanning me for a reaction, but I’m careful, as always, to betray no emotion. It’s the only way I’ve survived here, where I’m surveilled not only by the system but also through the eyes of everyone I encounter—even my own sister.

Surveillance is security, Rosa.

Only criminals need privacy.

Only criminals need privacy.

For so many years I used to believe everything my father said.

Those were the years when Soledad was a friend to our family; the years we lived in a warm, comfortable home, when food was abundant, when Nanny would dress me in silks before braiding my hair. I’d sneak downstairs during my mother’s dinner parties just to hear the sound of her laughter.

“How many more before you’ll lift the sanctions?” I ask, ripping the balaclava off my head. I feel the static of my hair; the compression of my chest. Brisk wind batters my face but the icy air is welcome against my heated skin.

Soledad shakes his head. “I can’t answer that. Your father is still alive, still feeding secrets to the enemy. For as long as we can’t know your mind, you’ll always be a question mark.” He shrugs, then looks away. “We all make sacrifices for the security of our nation, Rosabelle. For the security of our future. This is your sacrifice—and it may never end.”

He returns his eyes to me.

“Look,” he says. “You can kill them all at once or one at a time. I’ll let you decide. When you’re done, I’ll see about getting Clara some medicine.”

“And food,” I say too quickly, then pause, taking a moment to compose my face. “And firewood.”

“All at once, then,” he says, narrowing his eyes.

“All at once,” I agree. “And right now.”

Soledad raises his eyebrows. “You sure? One of them won’t stop screaming. She had a bad reaction to the sedative.”

I feel unseasonably warm. Overdressed. I distract myself by stuffing the balaclava into Papa’s coat pocket, and the thick envelope from earlier kisses me with a paper cut. The pain focuses my thoughts.

It’s not necessary to kill them like this.

We have among our ranks some of the best medics and scientists in the world; we possess far more advanced and humane ways to kill the rare spies who manage to breach Ark Island.

Of course, murdering them isn’t meant to be humane.

“Do you care how I kill them?” I ask, and my voice is mercifully steady.

The electric hum of the helicopter pulls my attention skyward. Clara will see it. She’ll know what it means.

“I don’t care how you do it.” Soledad smiles now; a real smile. “You’ve always been creative.”